LG Nexus 4 costs a fortune in continental Europe

When the LG Nexus 4 was launched last week, we were pleasantly surprised to learn it’ll carry a wallet-friendly price tag, specifically £239 for 8GB internal storage or £279 for 16GB. Not too shabby at all, considering the specs.

But spare a thought for those countries that don’t have access to Google Play, as the price is reportedly sky high.

That’s the story according to The Next Web, with potential LG Nexus 4 buyers in Italy taking to the local LG Mobile Facebook page to express their concerns. Mamma mia!

There’s a similar issue with LG Nexus 4 price in Austria, where only the 16GB model is available – for €549 (£440).

Meanwhile, over in Spain, Phone House has announced that it’ll no longer carry the LG Nexus 4, as it can’t compete with Google Play on price.

A statement on the Phone House Facebook page (translated from Spanish) reads: “Phone House has decided to suspend the sale of [the LG Nexus 4] after finding that the recommended retail price by LG of €599 and conditions offered for commercialization are worse than the MSRP published by Google on its website and does not maintain the commitment with customers and offer the lowest price guarantee that characterizes Phone House.”

So we should count ourselves lucky, clearly. Oh, and if you have an opinion on the LG Nexus 4, tell Matt.

Well the Spanish can go direct to Google Play too rather than their cpw equivalent I've read.
Fairly sure there's just a crossed wire in pricing loop somewhere though, cpw have from £31 on contract on website which seems rather high given sim free cost too

Seen a lot of people complaining about this, but it's not LG or Phone House's fault. With the Nexus 7, Google paid Asus for the project and paid them to manufacture the devices. As such, Asus aren't too bothered what they sell for as Google take any hit. With the Nexus 4, from what I've been hearing there's a completely different set-up. Google are buying Nexus 4's from LG to sell on the Play Store. The Nexus 4s in retail aren't coming from Google (like the Nexus 7), they're coming from LG. profit needs to be made the traditional way.

Really sucks to live in a country without google play support. I refuse to buy this phone for even 1 euro more than what it is sold on the google store.
Agree...anyone paying €599 for that thing needs their head examined...

Seen a lot of people complaining about this, but it's not LG or Phone House's fault. With the Nexus 7, Google paid Asus for the project and paid them to manufacture the devices. As such, Asus aren't too bothered what they sell for as Google take any hit. With the Nexus 4, from what I've been hearing there's a completely different set-up. Google are buying Nexus 4's from LG to sell on the Play Store. The Nexus 4s in retail aren't coming from Google (like the Nexus 7), they're coming from LG. profit needs to be made the traditional way.

Well LG aren't likely to be making zero profit on the ones going to Google (even if Google are, which I doubt) so seems like they really want to extract the urine with their pricing unless as I still suspect there's a breakdown in communications here.